Mbappe sits out scoreless draw, Ukraine's emotional victory, Poland eliminated

This episode dives into the latest updates and analyses from the 2024 Euros and Copa America, focusing on pivotal matches and player performances.

1. Kylian Mbappe's absence significantly impacted France's offensive strategy, resulting in a lackluster 0-0 draw.
2. Ukraine's victory was not just a win on the field but an emotional lift for the team and its supporters, reflecting broader national struggles.
3. Poland's reliance on Lewandowski, who could not turn the tide alone, led to their early tournament exit.
4. The Peru vs. Chile match in Copa America highlighted the physical style of play prevalent in the tournament, though lacking in goals.
5. The episode emphasizes the importance of tactical flexibility and depth in international tournaments.

1: Introduction

Hosts Alexi Lawless and David Mossey set the stage for the episode, highlighting key matches and players to watch. Alexi Lawless: "Welcome to the State of the Union podcast, where we look at the beautiful game on and off the field through the lens of red, white, and blue colored glasses."

2: Ukraine's Emotional Victory

Discussion on Ukraine's comeback win over Slovakia, emphasizing the emotional impact and significance for the team and its supporters. David Mossey: "It was very emotional. The players were crying."

3: Poland's Early Exit

Analysis of Poland's elimination and the implications of depending heavily on a single star player like Lewandowski. Alexi Lawless: "Robert Lewandowski and his Polish team, one of the first teams to get knocked out of this tournament."

4: Mbappe's Non-Participation

Exploration of the consequences of Mbappe's absence in the France vs. Netherlands match, and the strategic decisions surrounding his health. David Mossey: "A broken nose doesn't get better in just a few days."

5: Copa America Insights

Insights into the Peru vs. Chile match, noting the aggressive play and lack of goals, and setting expectations for future matches in the tournament. Alexi Lawless: "This was a bar fight."

1. Embrace team diversity: Avoid over-reliance on single players; cultivate a well-rounded team.
2. Prepare for emotional resilience: Foster a supportive environment that can handle the psychological pressures of international tournaments.
3. Adapt strategies in real-time: Be ready to adjust tactics based on player availability and opponent strategies.
4. Focus on physical conditioning: Ensure players are physically prepared for the demanding nature of back-to-back tournament games.
5. Engage fans beyond the game: Utilize emotional narratives and player stories to deepen fan engagement and support.

Alexi Lalas and David Mosse recap all the best moments of Summer of Stars Day 8. Ukraine picks up their first win of the tournament over Slovakia, an emotional comeback victory. Slovakia’s Ivan Schranz scored in the match to tie Jamal Musiala in the Golden Boot race. In Euro Group B, Austria’s 3-1 win made Poland the first to be eliminated, and France recorded the first scoreless draw of the tournament without Kylian Mbappe on the field. (3:50)
To wrap the show, the guys discuss Mexico’s generational shift. This Copa América they look to take the field without big names such as Guilllermo Ochoa, Hirving Lozano, and Raúl Jiménez. (20:15)

People

Kylian Mbappe, Robert Lewandowski, David Mossey, Alexi Lawless

Companies

FOX Sports

Content Warnings:

None

Indeed
We're driven by the search for better. But when it comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all. Don't search match with indeed if you need to hire, you need indeed, indeed is your matching and hiring platform with over 350 million global monthly visitors, according to indeed data and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast. Ditch the busywork. Use indeed for scheduling, screening and messaging so you can connect with candidates faster, leveraging over 140 million qualifications and preferences every day.

Indeed's matching engine is constantly learning from your preferences, so the more you use indeed, the better it gets. And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility and indeed.com lawless. Just go to indeed.com lawless right now and support our show by saying you heard about indeed on this podcast, indeed.com lawless. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire you need indeed.

Alexi Lawless
Hello sunshine. I'm Alexi lawless and welcome to the State of the Union podcast, where we look at the beautiful game on and off the field through the lens of red, white and blue colored glasses. Today's show is brought to you by Zillow agents Tours loans homes get home with Zillow we are coming to you live Thursday, June 21, following our 8th day of the 2020 €4 and our second day of the 2024, Copa America. As we make our way through this amazing summer of soccer, reminder, we'll be coming to you live after each and every day of the euros action and the Copa America action, giving you a wrap up and a preview of what's to come. But first, joining me as my friend, my colleague, my guiding lights, David Mossey, a soccer savant and a Fox soccer researcher, writer extraminee Mossy.

How are you on this Friday, June 21, in the year 2024? TGIF. I'm doing well. You know, I received a nice compliment today from our friend and a frequent guest on this pod, Jen Cooper. Oh, what happened?

David Mossey
She pointed out the fact that this summer I've been lifting my hat a bit more so people can actually see my face. In past World cups, I sometimes wore it so far down that with the shadow you couldn't even see my eyes so well. Maybe that has had an effect on this pod. And I say that because we come to you with good news and thanks for those of you that ingest this show out there on YouTube. We just hit 20,000, over 20,000 subscribers over there on YouTube.

Alexi Lawless
Thank you enough for subscribing over there so we must be doing something well, whether it's what we're talking about or whether it's the lighting of the great David Mossey's face, it's awesome. And I think it's spreading Mossy, because if I look around and for those of you that have watched over the last couple of days, we've lamented the fact that we are left here alone in our solitary types of environment here in the studio with nobody watching. Now, I think I'm counting 1234, potentially five ish people. So we're growing our audience on YouTube. We're growing our audience out there on all the different platforms, and we're growing human audience when it comes to people in the studio.

So thank you all for hanging out with us. All right. You're not going to hear it because it's not at that point. Have you done anything since last we spoke? 24 hours ago.

David Mossey
I've worked and slept. And how did it go, by the way? When I got home last night after that long day, I was an absolute mess. I did not know where I was or what was going on. And I got up this morning and I didn't have a crazy early call this morning.

Alexi Lawless
It was still early in the morning. But I got up and I turned on my shower. And then I started reading emails and started looking and researching stuff like that. And I had left the shower open. And all of a sudden in my hotel room, the alarm goes off, the fire alarm goes off.

And I think, oh, God, what's going on now? And I called down, nobody answered. And 15 minutes later, this alarm just keeps going, blaring. And I'm calling down. I'm calling down.

Finally somebody answers and says, hey, listen, this has been going off for 20 minutes now. Can you get somebody up? Nobody's coming up. Nobody's coming. Half an hour later, finally somebody comes to the door and the steam in my shower had gone and set the alarm off.

And the guy looked at me and said, yeah, we get this all the time. And then left. And another five minutes later, it was turned off. So that's how I started the day. But then it got better because then I went and talked about soccer.

Shall we talk about soccer, mash? Shall we light this candle? Let's do it. All right. Another summer of soccer day.

Day eight. Like I said, today's scores. Let's just get them over real quick here. Slovakia, one. Ukraine two.

Poland one. Austria, three. Netherlands, zero. France, zero. And then over in the Copa America, Peru, zero.

Chile, zero. Let's start with Slovakia and Ukraine. Slovakia won Ukraine two. Big, big comeback. When it comes to Ukraine, the best moments of the day.

If I'm looking at that game, it's Ukraine. Happy days are here again. And you don't need me to tell you that from an off field perspective, this is a fan favorite, this results and this team that they are at this tournament, given what's going on over there, it warms the cockles of my heart and the way in which they came back scoring two goals to come back from down 10. Wonderful, wonderful thing. And they are alive.

Ukraine are alive. Incredible scenes afterwards. The players were crying. It was very emotional. The Slovakia goal was scored by Ivan Schranz, his second of the tournament.

David Mossey
So he now equals Musiala in the golden boot lead. But then, as you mentioned, Ukraine came back. Yarmschuk got the winner. He's a pretty good player. Former Benfica played with Valencia this past season.

So, yeah, I was very happy to see that Ukraine get the win and we'll see if they can get out of group either. Incidentally, for those of you that watched it on Fubo, that is the second to last game. Tomorrow morning, the last game will happen on Fubo. And as I've said before, I have made an executive decision. All right, should we move on to the next game or anything else you want to say about that Ukraine Grant?

No, that's it. Like everything to play for now going forward. Poland, Austria. Keep in mind that when it comes to Austria, from the beginning of the tournament, I have said they are not a dark horse, but certainly not a lot of people have put them, for example, in my top ten. They were my power rankings top ten even after they lost their first game, because I thought they played really, really well against France.

Alexi Lawless
They come back here and I think they show why I am so bullish about them getting three to one result and Poland goes out. Keep in mind, Robert Lewandowski had been hurt. He comes in in this game in the second half when it's one to one, you think he's going to play superman and come in and score the winning goal and everything, and they end up letting in two goals. And so Robert Lewandowski and his polish team, one of the first teams to get knocked out of this tournament. Yeah, he came on for Pietek, who had scored the Poland goal.

David Mossey
I was thinking about Lewandowski today. It's not quite Erlen Holland level because he at least qualifies for major tournaments, but it is one of these cases of a great player who was born in a country where we never get to see him at his best, at the international level? Yes. I mean, we can, you know, make fun of the fact that he came on and then they scored and everything. It's not his fault.

Alexi Lawless
And he has done more than his share over the years to prop that team up, to carry that team, to score the goals. And to your point, our judgment and assessment of what Robert Lewandowski is as a soccer player is not through the polish national team, through no fault of his own. It's just, you know, where the team that he plays for, like you said, a bunch of other. A bunch of other players. And so he will still go down as one of the great goal scorers in the game.

Don't worry about it. On Austria, I know when we talk about best goals of a tournament, people are always drawn to long distance strikes. And we've already had some in this tournament. Arda Goulaire, Shaqiri Hillman for Denmark against England. But I love that.

David Mossey
Austria. Go ahead. Goal. The dummy, Bayernaltovich. The perfectly timed run by Baumgartner.

The finish that was fantastic. And the finish where it just proved that you don't have to hit it hard necessarily, you just have to hit it with direction. It almost was a fate of complete as you saw that ball come across. And to your point, the wonderful dummy there and the coordination, the understanding between the two up there. And then everything was perfect.

Alexi Lawless
The pass was perfect, the dummy was perfect, the first touch was perfect, and then ultimately the finish was perfect. And then they just kicked on from there. So congratulations to Austria. Still work to do for them, but Poland is out and that group comes down to those three. Austria certainly has an opportunity to go on even as a third place team right now.

But you know, that third game is going to be important. I agree. All right, let's get on to, I guess, what would be the marquee game of the day for the euros. The Netherlands and France ends up zero zero. Sometimes zero zero.

Games are exciting and entertaining. This was not necessarily one of those. Killian Mbappe was there, but he didn't get it on the field. There was talk about him possibly coming on as a substitute. We know that he has broken his nose.

We know that if he were to step on the field, it would be with the mask. That didn't happen. General thoughts on this game, because when it comes to the best moments of the day, my notes for France are no Mbappe, no party. And we had talked about by committee, everybody else kind of rising to the occasion and that didn't happen. And yet I looked at this game and both teams were content.

And I've said before that being content in life is actually a good thing. It's something to strive for, but being content on a soccer field, it does not mix well and it does not produce good soccer. I'm still trying to understand the Mbappe situation. I know I went on a rant yesterday about it, but okay, so he doesn't play today. Kellini said on the air that this is not going to be any better a few days from now.

David Mossey
A broken nose doesn't get better in just a few days. So was he available today and Didier Deschamps just decided to be to have some caution there or could he not play at all? And then if he couldn't play today and it was just kind of a decoy thing to list him as the sub, what does that mean for him moving forward the rest of the tournament? So that situation, I'm still very curious where we're going to go with it. It was interesting talking to Giorgio today in the green room about, because he's broken his nose multiple numbers of times.

Which you can tell by looking at him. Yeah, you can, and he'll be the first to point it out. But he talked about how when he broke his nose, he got surgery immediately, but he got surgery specifically to get him back on the field as quickly as possible. So it's different. If you were to get surgery and the surgery that you needed just to fix it, that's going to keep you out of length of time.

Alexi Lawless
But he got kind of emergency surgery and I guess would be soccer surgery on his nose, which enabled him a couple days later to be able to play. I don't see any reports that he is going to. Killian Mbappe is going to get surgery. So to your point, it's not going to necessarily get any better unless it really wasn't broken or it's really not that bad. And a couple of days here or there, but either way, I think he is ultimately going to wear a mask.

And again, I remind you, this is a player on a yellow card. So now he doesn't play this game at all, doesn't step on the field. They play a lackluster zero zero game. But now everybody thinks he's going to play in the, in the third game. Now what if he gets a yellow card and they go through and he doesn't have to and he doesn't get to play in the, in the quarterfinals?

David Mossey
It was interesting what Deschamps did lineup wise with Mbappe out. He brought in true mini and then pushed Griezmann up to a more advanced role. And this was a neat coaching matchup, by the way. Ronald Koorman and D day Deschamps, the two coaches in this tournament who won this competition as players. So they went head to head today.

But we did have a controversial VAR moment we have to discuss in the second half. The Netherlands had a goal disallowed Xavi Simone's put in the back of the net, but Dumfries was judged to have interfered with Mike Mignon's ability to dive and make the save. Mark Clattenberg seemed to agree with the decision. Landon Donovan did not just perusing X, a lot of people had an issue with it. Did you have a problem with that goal being disallowed?

The argument being that Mike Mignon had no chance to save it. He would not have gotten to it anyway. You have to give him a chance to save it. I mean, I suppose he could have done the courtesy dive, but if you watch in that play, he immediately recognizes that, hey, you at least have to give me a chance to dive. And by the way, he was playing great and.

Alexi Lawless
And saved their ass a couple of times, to your point, I don't think necessarily he could have gotten to that, but you still have to be give him the chance to dive. So I had no problem. I had no problem that it was called in the moment and then the VAR looked at it and confirmed it. And if it hadn't been called in that moment from the AR, I still think that they would have gone upstairs and they would have said, yeah, you can't. You can't do that because at least you have to get even if.

Even if he dives and misses it, at least you give him the opportunity to dive. So I had no problem with that. It sucks for Netherlands, but that's the way it goes. And actually they seem pretty consistent with that. I remember in the Champions League, Leipzig had a goal controversially dislodged against Real Madrid, and if you're in an offside position and you interfere at all in the play, they chalk off the goal.

David Mossey
So it's a pretty low threshold of how involved you have to be in the play. So at least they are consistent when it comes to that. I've said that I don't think that this particular Netherlands team is elite. My mind is still not changed, but this was a better performance from them. And I do think that the french team is elite, but I was a little disappointed that they didn't kind of rise to the occasion, like I said, and collectively with the spotlight on them and not Mbappe, do something bigger and better.

Alexi Lawless
But again, they were fine with the point and they go back to their corners and do what they have to do. All right, so we switch over to Copa America. Yes. Second day of Copa America, we find ourselves down in Dallas, Texas. When I say Dallas, I mean Arlington, Texas, right over there at, at and T Stadium.

Is that what it's called over there? Correct. Which will be the site of the US's first game against Bolivia. It will. It will.

And we have Peru, Chile. This was, you know, I wrote down in my notes here in terms of the moments of the day. This was a bar fight. This was two teams where familiarity breeds contempt. This was two teams that at times wanted no part in actually playing any types of soccer.

This was two teams that basically just kicked each other all over the field. Great crowd. It should be said they weren't treated to a great game of soccer in terms of goals, but it was kind of a Friday night's lights, or I guess in this case, Friday night fights type of scenario. And it also brought up the different textures and the different dynamics of different tournaments because last night, the Argentina game, that was pretty physical, too, and tonight was pretty physical. And maybe that's a trend that's going to happen going forward when it comes to.

Comes to Copa America. Thoughts on the Chile Peru, zero, zero final. We had our first no nil in both tournaments today. It took until match 21 at the euros and took until match number two at the Copa America. Yeah.

David Mossey
And I wasn't surprised. I don't think either of these teams tonight is all that talented, so I don't think there was any other type of game we were going to get with these two. It was the Ricardo Gareca bowl. He's now coaching Chile after coaching Peru for many years. So, yeah, it's a good result for Canada.

Alexi Lawless
You know, Jesse Marsh tonight watching this, and Canada, I'm licking my chops because you lose to Argentina. All right, fine. That was to be expected. Everybody could have predicted that. So now you got to make your points up against the other two teams.

And you just saw these two teams from a canadian perspective. Second place is there for you. It's being put in the palm of your hand. And frankly, only losing two nil to Argentina, from a goal difference standpoint, might be okay, because I could see Argentina hammering the likes of Chile and Peru by a bigger margin. Right.

And look this on our podcast. We are not ageists by any stretch of the imagination. But it is a story, and it's always a story when you're talking about sports. And so we came on air and we talked about the incredible experience, but also the incredible age of players that were on the field for both teams and involved with both teams. And again, it's not about how old you are.

It's whether you are able to do the job, whether you have the capacity to be able to do the job when the whistle blows. And both of these teams, collectively and individually, they're not up to it. And so I don't think it's any surprise where they are in Comnobol World cup qualification right now. And if they hoped to use this tournament to kind of jumpstart their qualification and to discover new talent or discover a vein of form that has eluded them so far, this was not a great indication that anything's going to change for either of these two teams going forward after the first game, but still just the first game. Look forward, Mossy.

What do we got coming up tomorrow? We have €3 games tomorrow. First off, as you mentioned, it's an emotional occasion for Kyla. The final game on Fubo this summer, Georgia against Czechia in Group F. All right.

David Mossey
Both teams lost their opening game, so they're desperate for points. We'll see what happens there. And then the other group f game against Portugal in Dortmund should be an incredible atmosphere because you have the turkier fans, you have all the Ronaldo fans and the crowd that he always attracts. So very excited for that matchup. Did you see Roberto Martinez's press conference relative to Cristiano Ronaldo?

I did. And your thoughts, my friend, and explain to the folks out there that might have missed what happened. Again, you had the same reaction with Ruben Diaz. You think everybody in that Portugal camp feels this pressure publicly to talk up how important Ronaldo is, how much they love him, how much they need protect him. And you think it's a bit of performative B's, as you like to say?

Alexi Lawless
I do think that it is a bit of performative B's. And if you got some of these players at their most honest, maybe wake them up in the middle of the night, I think that they would have a different story to tell. And again, it's not because they don't like him. It's also not because they don't believe that he is a good player. But as soon as Roberto Martinez came in as the coach of Portugal and said, no, I'm not jettisoning him, I'm going to keep him.

Then you made your bed, and now you got to deal with it. And it was almost as if he was trying to convince us with this press conference where he was talking about how important Cristiano Ronaldo is and the players that he draws and everything that he said had an element of truth, but also everything that he said seemed like, again, he was trying to sell a skeptical public on why this is the case. And, look, I love Cristiano Ronaldo. I think he can score. I think he may even score tomorrow when he's.

When he's out there starting. But the question throughout this tournament, I think, is going to be, is this the best version of Portugal? And does the best version of Portugal not have Cristiano Ronaldo in the lineup? And how that relates to going forward? Arte Guiller is an injury doubt.

David Mossey
Vincenzo Montello mentioned that in the press conference today. That's disappointing. I really wanted to see him and Ronaldo on the same field together. He scored that great goal in their first game against Georgia, became the first teenager to score in his Euros debut since Ronaldo in 2004. He plays for Real Madrid, obviously, Ronaldo played for Real Madrid for many years, so that would be sort of a neat matchup.

A 19 year old and a 39 year old. Hopefully we get it. We'll see. Maybe he'll get on the field. Maybe he won't pull an Mbappe and actually go on the field.

Alexi Lawless
What else do we got tomorrow? And then the final euros game is Belgium. Romania in Cologne. That's group e. Romania had that great opening win, 30 over Ukraine, while Belgium had a disastrous loss, 10 to Slovakia.

David Mossey
So we'll see if Belgium can bounce back. Desperate Belgium. I love it. I can't wait to see what they. What they are bringing.

Alexi Lawless
And to your point, you know, the line for any team in a tournament can kind of go up and down, and Romania on a high right now, but they're going to come up against a desperate Belgium team. If Belgium were to, you know, what? The bed here, that would really officially signify the end of the golden era, right? I mean. Oh, absolutely.

Golden generation. Okay, shifting over to Copa tomorrow, we have our first two game day. Yes. We have two games, both from Group B. Ecuador will take on Venezuela at Levi Stadium, Santa Clara, and then Mexico will take on Jamaica at NRG Stadium in Houston.

Well, I mean, I think this leads it perfectly into my one for the road, which is our friends to the south, Mexico, who we share so much with. I know how much you want to make sure that I at least acknowledge that for those that are watching, our one for the road video is playing. So there it is. It's playing. Can I go now?

David Mossey
Absolutely. All right. We have this love hate relationship when it comes to Mexico. We don't hate nobody, we don't hate anybody. But over the years we are forever entwined and we've talked already about the possibility of a tournament changing fortunes.

Alexi Lawless
This is a Mexico team. I cannot think of a point in history when spirits have been lower and belief has been lower in terms of el tre and therefore the expectations are very low. And yet the part of me that's been around for so long and seeing the way Mexico thinks and plays cannot help but think that in this moment Mexico will do what we've talked about and use this tournament to reignite. And whether it's with, you know, out with the old, with, you know, Ochoa out and these are chucky out or these types of players that have been around for a while and we see a new generation or we just see a new version of El Tree now, maybe that's, and I will use this word, wishful thinking, and I do wish for Mexico to do well. It's better for the US when Mexico is good.

It's better for Concacaf when Mexico is good. It's better for the future of soccer in the United States when Mexico is good. And these relationships and these connections, they are only going to get stronger and they are only going to continue. And so I hope that we see a different Mexico team, but there are a lot of people out there that I think rightfully so, are going to be standing there with arms crossed saying, all right, well, let's see what you got here. And if they go out and they get annihilated and embarrassed in the Copa America, that's going to be an even bigger problem for them going forward.

Anything before we go mossy on this or anything else, I'll just say the. Big point of interest for me, Copa America tomorrow is Kendry Paez, this ecuadorian teenager I've been carrying on about. I love him, think he's an incredible talent. He's going to be joining Chelsea when he turns 18. I think he's going to be a big star in world football for years to come.

David Mossey
And so I could see him being a breakout star at this Copa America tomorrow will be our first look at him. Would you like me to have him as my player to watch? Ah, that would be phenomenal. Okay. For those that have been watching our coverage over on Fox, you will know that we have well there's two players to watch.

Alexi Lawless
There's one where we actually do the lineups, right, the eleven. And the guy magically appears from the ground and boom, there he is. And we point to him, we tell things, and then there's right before the game starts, we all kind of go down the line and we give our player to watch. Would you rather have it in the graphic form and me talking about him in the eleven or right before we go on air as one of the. One of my players to watch or the player that I want to watch.

David Mossey
In the starting eleven? Starting eleven. All right, so you want the whole dance there? Yes. All right.

Alexi Lawless
Your wish is my command. All right. I am but a puppet for you, my friend. I will do your bidding. I will do whatever you want.

All right. Tomorrow, tune in for the eleven. Okay? Because at the end of it, when I go, but you know who I have my eye on. Boom.

That's what's going to happen. And if everything goes all right, back in the control room where Mossy is, hopefully Mister Paez will magically appear from the floor and I will give the people what they want. Anything before we go, mossy. That's it. All right.

Thank you again for downloading and reviewing and subscribing and doing all the different things you do. Thanks also to zillow for being incredible partners. And again, thank you for over 20,000. Now, when it comes to subscribing over there on YouTube, keep on. Oh, what did they tell me?

Uh, smash the button. Smash the button, people. I don't know if that is that right. Anybody still here that's not of my generation that can come? Okay, I'm getting thumbs up.

Smash the button. Smash the subscribe button. Good God. All right, we'll talk again tomorrow. And until then, and as always, my friends, size the day.